As the NFL has wrapped its arms around Taylor Swift and everything she has to offer, so have its broadcasters.
Not every sports media personality is thrilled about that, as shown by Chris “Mad Dog” Russo blasting CBS for 110 seconds for Swift’s 54 seconds of air time during the Super Bowl or Tony Dungy bizarrely claiming that it’s proof that fans have become disenchanted.
But everyone from Mike Tirico to Jim Nantz to Kevin Burkhardt to Al Michaels has tried to embrace Swift as much as possible when she attends a game broadcasted by their network. The same can’t be said for Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, as she was not in attendance in the lone game the Chiefs were on Monday Night Football in 2023.
Swift was in attendance for another game that was supposed to be on Buck and Aikman’s assignment list, but Week 15 Chiefs-Patriots became the first-ever game flexed out of Monday Night Football.
Still, that doesn’t mean Aikman doesn’t have opinions on what that means for the league’s popularity and viewership numbers soaring. During a first look at his interview on the Sports Media with Richard Deitsch podcast (the full episode is out Monday), Aikman spoke about whether he’d be amenable if Swift lent herself to the broadcast booth for a quarter or so.
I have a longform podcast with @TroyAikman coming out on Monday but if you want a small sliver of it, here’s Troy on the Taylor Swift impact on the NFL and how she has a standing invite to the Monday Night Football booth.https://t.co/ZejPTpdEwU
— Richard Deitsch (@richarddeitsch) September 6, 2024
“I loved it, quite honestly,” Aikman said of the NFL’s Taylor Swift palooza. “I loved it. I think that the fact that a generation of people got exposed to the NFL that, in all likelihood, wouldn’t have otherwise, I think is really positive. I think it’s fair to say the NFL liked it. I just wish we had more Chiefs games.”
ESPN is set to have two Chiefs games for the 2024 NFL season, Week 5 vs. New Orleans in Kansas City and Week 9 vs. Tampa Bay, also in Kansas City.
“I think at the end of the day, regardless of whatever else is going on, Joe and I, we do try to have some fun with whatever it might be,” Aikman says. “Not just with Taylor Swift, but whatever’s happening there. At the end of the day, people are tuned in because they want to watch football.”
If there were ever the opportunity to get Swift in the booth, Aikman would be all for it.
“Are you kidding me? We’ll escort her up,” he adds. “There’s no doubt that if we could get her on Monday Night Football in the booth, we would interview her, and we’d have a place for her to sit, and she could take as long as she wanted. I say that now my producer may feel otherwise.”
Take that, ManningCast.
While that remains somewhat of a pipe dream, consider Aikman and Buck all in if given the opportunity.
About Sam Neumann
Since the beginning of 2023, Sam has been a staff writer for Awful Announcing and The Comeback. A 2021 graduate of Temple University, Sam is a Charlotte native, who currently calls Greenville, South Carolina his home. He also has a love/hate relationship with the New York Mets and Jets.